Shining Wings
by King Meliodas
Summary: Levi is one of the last ghouls left, and he's not okay with it, but he's dealing as well as he can. Until Erwin finds out, and hatches the plan of using an inhuman monster to fight Titans years before Eren Yeager shows up. Time to show what the original man-eaters can do. (Knowledge of Tokyo Ghoul not necessary to read, knowledge of Birth of Levi gaiden helpful.)


**Chapter One**

Isabel's sobs had not yet fallen silent by the time Levi returned home. The atmosphere hung tight and heavy with tension, wound ever tighter by incremental sniffles from the other side of the door.

Farlan looked up, pained. "Levi… did you kill them…?" His voice was rough with prolonged distress.

This decaying hovel of a house had seen its fair share of misery since its construction, like any house in the underground city, but Levi had never imagined that it could seem this big, this dark, this cold. Ever since he'd fished first Isabel then Farlan out of the gutters and invited them in, Levi's home had seemed positively cramped and fairly bursting with life at all hours. Levi had all but forgotten what a cold, miserable night felt like until Isabel had stormed in with half of her hair hacked off, her clothes in disarray, and her skin covered in blood and bruises. The sight and smell of her blood had awakened an ancient rage in Levi that he'd also almost forgotten.

It had reminded him that he hadn't gone hunting in months.

In the time since he'd gone out to fix that, Farlan had moved from the table to a slumped position outside of her bedroom, staring dejectedly at the floor. His red-rimmed eyes roved over Levi's bloodied figure and lingered on the wrapped knives dangling from his hand.

Levi grunted in response, moving into the room to dump the knives on the table carelessly with one hand while the other tore off his cloak and the kerchief tied around his neck. The blades weren't just for show, though he didn't in the least need them to accomplish his bloody intentions. Knives were… less messy than the alternative. In many different ways. If Levi was ever caught for killing someone with a knife, he would only be arrested as a criminal, which was nothing new. And if anybody ever found the bodies of his victims, they'd look just like innumerable others that had fallen to the underground city's lower element, if these to a slightly more psychotic element than usual. Not many victims of gang violence were found with their internal organs removed and large sections of muscle flayed from their bodies, after all.

Levi's stomach sang with warm fullness as he collapsed next to Farlan against the wall.

"…You shouldn't do things like that," his friend said quietly.

"Why the fuck shouldn't I?" They were the lowest of scum. Nobody would miss them. There was no more perfect victim, in his opinion. Not that he made 'victims' very often. For what they'd done to Isabel, he'd made an exception.

The fuckers had still smelled of her when he'd caught up to them. He'd made sure to wipe out every trace of that warm, familiar scent with the putrid stink of their fear before he'd perfumed the night with their blood, too.

Farlan wasn't looking at him anymore. "You'll get caught."

Levi snorted. "The military police don't come down here."

"The gangs. They'll notice if you start taking out their members."

With the weekly death toll what it was in the slums, Levi doubted that. That very toll was the iron chain that kept him in this stinking cesspit, even more so than his birth or state of poverty. Nobody down here noticed when people vanished. Dozens fell to gangs and illness and starvation and plain suicide every month. Levi took full advantage of this when he hunted. Very often, all he had to do was wander the streets to find his next meal freshly dead and waiting for him. As he'd said before, though, the state he left his victims in was somewhat more noticeable than the usual gang violence and general illnesses. It was a blessing that he got hungry so infrequently; rumors were already spreading through the city about the organ-thief killer; organ-stealing was old hat in the slums, but the flayed muscles were far more unique. Any more often than once a month or so and he might actually come to the attention of somebody with the means of tracking him down. (One of the few drawbacks to his living arrangement was that there weren't a whole lot of ways to dispose of the bodies afterwards; no rivers ran down here, and burying them wasn't possible when the whole cavern was near-solid rock.)

Cannibalizing corpses dead of illness and starvation was the stuff of nightmares for a human. For a ghoul, it was more or less the highest moral ground attainable. Nobody got hurt that hadn't already been going to, and Levi got a steady supply of meat. He hadn't chosen to be born with this fucked-up digestive tract, but he'd chosen to make the best of it that he possibly could. He'd seen what it was like to choose otherwise.

_"See, boy?"_ He could still hear the voice of the man who'd raised him, underlined by the wet, meaty sounds of a man's body being dismembered. _"If you use your knives, like me, then even if the police find the bodies they won't know it was the work of a ghoul. Use your head, and you can stay safe forever. People vanish every day and nobody even cares!"_

Kenny Ackerman. A demonstrable madman, but he hadn't been wrong about everything. People vanished, constantly, and all a smart ghoul had to do to get a living was be in the right place to snatch them up. Ackerman's methods had been… wasteful. Depraved. The man hadn't even had the excuse of not being able to digest human food that Levi did. And yet, despite all of that, he had been smart enough to get away with it for years. His advice, sickening as it was, was sound.

Had Levi lost his head today? His comfortably full stomach didn't seem to think so. The dark satisfaction in his heart that increased with every one of Isabel's muffled sobs didn't seem to think so. Levi's control had lasted years, decades. Not once had he been caught. If he'd lost control tonight, it was a slip he could afford.

"I don't intend to make a habit of it," Levi finally answered, entirely truthful.

The conversation ended there, though Isabel continued to sniffle long into the night.

* * *

When he looked back on it, Levi should have taken Farlan's advice when he'd had the chance. It was only days after that conversation that they were tracked down by a squad of Survey Corps soldiers and given a choice that wasn't really a choice at all.

The plan to join the Survey Corps had been stupid. It had been beyond stupid. Levi cursed himself daily for acquiescing to it, no matter what bullcrap Farlan had spouted about stealing documents, double-crossing their employer, and living full lives aboveground (and double no matter what threats those bastards had been spouting about sending them to jail—Levi wasn't some pathetic human who pissed all over himself when shown a blade). He'd given into temptation in the heat of the moment, imagining throttling that smug look right off of Erwin Smith's smug fucking face, and was now regretting it fully. He was going to get himself found out and killed within days. There was no getting around it. Hiding his true nature while living aboveground was even harder than he'd ever imagined it could be. For one thing, the military was strict with its recruits' schedules. Levi didn't have time to duck out and find food that he could actually eat unless he wanted to trade his already-limited sleep for it. For another, their meals were communal, and he couldn't not eat without people taking notice.

He hadn't imagined that this plan would take months. He'd thought that it would be days, weeks at best before he could murder that blond bastard and flee back to the safe haven of his filthy sewers. Farlan could do what he liked with those secret documents, Levi would help as far as he was able, and if everything went well maybe he could set his friends up with a semi-decent life afterwards. That had seemed worth the risk at the time, too, but even the first part of the plan was proving much more difficult than anticipated. So far he'd been skating under the radar by slipping food to Isabel (who neither questioned nor refused it, used to his habit of doing so from their time living together) and covering his mouth with his hands to mask the fact that he wasn't actually sipping his drink when he lifted it, but it wasn't going to work long-term. He was getting hungry.

Desperately, Levi considered telling Isabel or Farlan. Revealing his true nature to them and begging for help. He couldn't really picture a scenario where that didn't end with them running away, though. Maybe even attacking or reporting him to the authorities. Certainly never speaking to him again. That wasn't… something he was prepared to deal with. It wasn't that bad. He wasn't weak. He could take care of his own fucking self, even now.

"_You're going to be alone your entire life_," the man who'd raised him had said. "_You'd better be able to take care of yourself."_

Nobody had ever known Levi's true nature. Nobody aside from that one man. He supposed that his mother must have had some sort of fucking inkling, but she was dead now, and Captain Ackerman was the only person on the planet who knew that Levi was a ghoul.

Ghouls were legends, Ackerman had told him. So humanity thought. Stories of them existed dating back to before the appearance of Titans, but in a hundred years nobody had ever seen one. As far as anyone on the street knew, they'd either always been myths or they'd vanished along with 90% of humanity in the onslaught of the Titans. Levi was living proof that at least a handful had made it into the walls, but even he had no idea where they were hiding or how many were left. His father was missing, his mother was dead, and the man who'd raised him only knew as much about ghouls as any other person who'd heard the myths. All he knew of his own kind was from stories.

So no, going to Isabel and Farlan for help was not an option at all.

That was how, two months in, Levi ended up prowling through the nighttime streets, his stomach a black sucking void of hunger. He'd pretended to turn in earlier than usual so as to hide his daytime clothes beneath the blanket, then risen while Isabel, Farlan, and their fellow recruits slept and crept from the room in preternatural silence. He hadn't been able to wrangle a cloak under his sheets, but more traditional methods of anonymity were a lot smaller.

Ghouls, the legends said, had once worn masks when they went out to hunt. Levi had never had the means nor inclination to make a proper one, but the kerchief he used when cleaning had always covered the lower half of his face well enough to serve.

It was surprisingly easy to slip out of the training camp in the middle of the night. Levi got the impression that even a normal human might have managed easily, unaided by his extra boost in agility and speed. It probably shouldn't have been that surprising, all things considered. Military corruption ran bone-deep, and it wasn't like anyone expected soldiers to give up drinking or partying, even if they were training the next generation of recruits. It was convenient, if morally disgusting. It also meant that there were likely several bars within walking distance of the camp, which was also fairly convenient. Bars drew lowlifes like candles drew moths. Maybe, just maybe, there'd be some scum deserving of an encounter with a starving ghoul hanging around.

He held onto that thought well past midnight, when the first two bars had turned up nobody worse than a few rowdy drunkards and Wall Garrison troops who might or might not have been on duty. Nobody who deserved the end that Levi had to offer. It had been a slim hope, some part of him acknowledged. However pessimistic an outlook he had on life, it still hadn't seemed likely that he would meet somebody who truly deserved an ignoble, selfish death just by walking the streets for a few hours. The larger part of him was just getting desperate. The pangs of hunger in his stomach had turned to shooting starbursts of pain. He was starting not to care how deserving his victim was, and that more than anything was dangerous.

Luckily, just when he was about to call it a night, the third bar bore fruit. A few streets down, in an alley off of the street too narrow for a horse, the sounds of scuffling were loud above the distant noises of revelry. Cloth shifted, flesh slid against flesh, something hit the dirt with a solid thump, and a woman groaned. It was not a happy sound. Levi peered down the dim alley from around the corner, angling himself to remain hidden.

Struggling figures resolved themselves out of the twilight to make an unexpected tableau. From the sounds, Levi had been expecting some kind of drunken sexual assault. Instead, a woman in the uniform of the Wall Garrison stood bent over the limp body of another, smaller woman in civvies. The civilian woman was young and attractive with vibrantly red hair, and also tied hand and foot, sprawled unconscious on the ground. The soldier was attempting to manhandle her towards an empty wooden crate stamped 'FRAGILE' that stood atop a wheeled pallet nearby, and was apparently having trouble maintaining a grip on her insubstantial party clothes.

Human trafficker, Levi recognized instantly. Pretty young girls vanished from the slums sometimes, but more often the victims were middle-class citizens of Wall Maria or Wall Rose. Better-kempt, usually had all of their teeth, and rarely knew how to fight back the way girls who'd grown up like Isabel did. They were sold to corrupt military and political officials in the capital more often than not.

The thought, the very fucking thought, had Levi's eyes bleeding red into the sclera and iris until only his pupil remained dark against a field of crimson. His bloodlust rose like a roaring in his ears. The faint voice in the back of his head which was noting that female human traffickers were nearly always former victims themselves was drowned out entirely. He didn't care. He couldn't care. He couldn't remember the last time the hunger had been this painful. He wasn't going to find anybody better tonight, maybe ever.

"_These scum deserve it,"_ Ackerman had said. Levi couldn't remember why that thought had used to make him nauseous. Now it only made him hungry.

The woman was looking down at a scrap of torn cloth in her hands and cursing when a hundred and fifty pounds of solid muscle bowled her backwards. Her head rebounded off of the cobblestone ground with a sickening crack that left a smear of red wetness behind. She didn't have time to make a sound before Levi's knife bisected her trachea, spilling more red wetness onto the cobbles.

Levi crouched atop of her dying body for a few moments, breathing heavily, staring at that redness. At last, he wrenched himself away long enough to saw through the unconscious girl's bonds and hoist her limp body into the crate that had been her intended prison. Shoving her out into the streets in this state was like not saving her at all; at least in there she'd be somewhat sheltered until she woke up and could make her way home. He placed the lid on the crate as neatly as he could.

Then, quick as thought, he was back atop the dead trafficker, all but drooling. Hunting for live pretty wasn't something he did often, but this was a part he was infinitely familiar with. It took only a few expert slashes of his knives before Levi was triumphantly removing the slippery lump that was the woman's heart. In his eagerness, he didn't bother with rolling up the sleeves of his shirt. It was all he could do to shove his mask up before he was biting deeply into the muscular meat, blood spurting across his lower face and sleeves alike. It only took a few bites to devour the entire organ, capillaries crunching between his molars and blood dribbling down his chin. Another slash opened up her abdomen, revealing the wet glisten of her digestive tract. Heart and liver first, Levi knew instinctively, even lost as he was in the bloody ecstasy of a meal so long deferred. Those were the most nutritious, and also the best-tasting.

Her liver was extracted and halfway to his mouth when a nearby rustle caught his attention. Something cold and hard just barely kissed the nape of his neck above his collar.

"Don't move." A deep voice, guttural with fury, commanded. A familiar voice, for all he'd never heard it speak in that tone before.

Levi stiffened all over, the shell of bloodlust surrounding him cracking straight down the center at the sound of that voice. He obeyed more out of shock than any desire to submit. The liver slithered out of his stunned grip to hit the cobblestones with an obscene splat. Every fiber of his body was jumping with shock. He'd been caught. He'd been _caught_. This was first time he'd ever been caught in his entire life. He'd thought—he'd hoped… But he'd been caught, at last, just when he'd thought his cover was more secure than it had ever been.

He'd been caught by that fucking blond bastard Erwin Smith.

"Turn around. Slowly." Erwin's voice didn't waver. Well, he was an officer in the Survey Corps. He'd probably never stumbled across a man cannibalizing a corpse, but he'd likely seen much worse done by Titans in the field. The Survey Corps was difficult to shock. And damn them, they had quick reflexes. The coming fight was going to be pretty tough. Thank God he'd managed to get down at least part of his meal before the bastard had showed up.

Playing meek, Levi obeyed, lifting his bloodied hands into sight and slowly turning to face his erstwhile superior. As he'd thought, the man was at the ready, swords out and in position, as unwavering as a stone statue. Gleaming steel moved from his nape to hover threateningly beneath his chin. Levi stayed determinedly still as the tip flashed sharply upwards in the moonlight. His kerchief mask fluttered to the ground in two separate pieces.

Erwin's mask of cold determination slipped visibly as Levi's face was revealed beneath the makeshift mask. Aside from being one of the last people Erwin might have expected to find in this position, Levi imagined he looked a sight, blood all across his face, throat, shirt, and arms. He'd lost control over his usual fastidiousness, driven by the aching hunger. The spots of blood itched at him like ants on his skin now that he was more aware. He couldn't see them, but he knew that his eyes were flushed the deep, inhuman red of a ghoul's kakugan.

"Levi?" Erwin's hands still didn't waver. "Is that you?"

"Yeah. It's me." Levi grated out. His voice was low and full of gravel, only partly owing to his transformation. Most of it was frustration, and just a little dash of humiliation thrown in for good measure. He hadn't eaten in forever. He was still starving. That was still no balm to his pride, no excuse for this lapse in his vigilance. He'd never wanted to be caught crouched over a corpse like a mindless fucking beast, not by anyone, certainly not by the holier-than-thou Captain Smith. Even if it was just for a little while, even if he murdered the man right here to keep his secret, it was galling. Ackerman hadn't yet been caught, and he'd been doing this for _decades_.

"What… is this? What _are_ you?" the man bit out, uncertainty warring with fury in his face. He was obviously shaken. Who wouldn't be? It was clear by the unnatural hue of Levi's eyes that this was something far more outlandish than the relatively simple scenario of stumbling across a psychopath at work. Levi was no Titan, but he obviously wasn't human, either. He was actually a little bit interested in whether Erwin would be able to connect what he was seeing to the childhood ghost stories.

Not interested enough to wait around and see, though.

_Sorry, Farlan, looks like I can't keep that promise after all._

Levi launched himself backwards into a roll, scooping up his knives from the ground and avoiding the slash of swords that followed his descent. Armed once more, he braced and sprang forwards. His foot ground the woman's liver into a greasy smear beneath his sole.

The first rush was by necessity turned into a smooth dive beneath the second swipe of Erwin's swords. He lashed out in kind with his shorter blades, but his prey vanished beneath their arcs, and Levi was tossed away by a powerful booted blow to the ribs. There was no room in this damned alleyway! Levi hit the wall hard and instantly dropped to the ground, barely avoiding the sword that slammed home into the plaster wall. He rolled and sprang to his feet behind Erwin, but the man was already twisting. The second sword was caught with a screech against Levi's crossed knives for a bare moment before the smaller, weaker blades snapped apart.

Levi jerked away, but not quickly enough. The sword's tip drew a line of blood across his bicep, shredding his blood-splattered shirt.

So that was that answered. Levi had always wondered whether or not Titan-killing blades were forged of stuff strong enough to cut even a ghoul's skin. Regular knives couldn't scratch him. He'd particularly wondered about it that night some months back when this exact bastard had held possibly this exact blade to his throat and demanded that he join the Survey Corps. Back then, uncertainty had kept him cautious, not to mention Isabel's and Farlan's less-disputable danger. It wasn't the kind of thing you really wanted to have to find out in practice, whether or not a certain kind of weapon could kill you. At least now he knew that there really hadn't been any way out of the deal that had led him to this point.

The cut felt like a red-hot wire being held continuously against his skin. Levi had never been cut before in his life.

He danced backwards to avoid Erwin's pressing attacks, fetching up against the opposite wall of the alley far too soon. There was no room…! With a frustrated snarl, Levi ducked a strike from Erwin's free fist—he had abandoned the stuck sword in the wall—and launched himself deliberately at the opposite wall. A few quick, zigzagging springs had him up to the rooftops in seconds, perched on the very edge of the shingled slope and whirling around bare instants before the familiar _zip-thud _of a 3DM line hit his ears. Then Erwin was on him, single remaining sword swinging for the neck, cloak flaring out behind him like wings against the night sky.

Levi didn't need wings, or a sword or 3DM. He had enough space to move now.

Erwin didn't have time to complete his swing before his arm was caught and used as a lever to slam him headfirst into the roof. Shingles exploded in all directions. The sword was wrenched from his grasp and tossed carelessly aside. The soldier struggled futilely. Though Levi was much smaller in every dimension, his strength was incredible, and his speed doubly so. Erwin hadn't stood a ghost of a chance once they'd reached the roof.

For a moment, in the wake of the brief fight's intensity, absolute silence fell. Both men gasped for breath and glared in silence.

It was broken by Erwin. "What _are_ you?" he asked again, yanking against the grip on his arms. He didn't budge an inch.

Above him, Levi snarled wordlessly, mind racing. Shit, this wasn't good. Erwin was a soldier. A fucking officer, even. He'd be missed. Worse, he might even be avenged. Before tonight, he'd planned to make the man's death look accidental, or natural, or something that might at least confuse suspicion away from him long enough for him to vanish back into the underground. Now… there would be no doubt. Levi gone in the middle of the night, Erwin following, and then the man found gutted and half-eaten on a rooftop? There would be retribution. They might even discover the trail of his previous meals. This wasn't going to work.

Not killing him wasn't an option either. Levi had been caught, and he couldn't let that stand. Better to be hunted down as a human murderer than a ghoul. That, too, was a piece of childhood advice that had carried great weight, coming as it did from an actual human murderer. Ackerman was already one too many people who knew about Levi, though there wasn't much he could do about the old man as things stood.

Couldn't kill. Couldn't let live. What a steaming shitpile of a choice.

Beneath his racing mind, Levi could feel his mouth flooding with saliva, his stomach roaring with emptiness. He'd barely gotten to eat any of that woman. He was _starving_. He had a human pinned down right here, helpless, and it was making him so fucking hungry that he couldn't think straight. The delicious smells of human sweat and blood were all around him, seeping through him like water, and his gaze was locked on to the movement of the man's chest. That was where the heart beat behind the fragile ribs, juicy and meaty and full of salty blood that would just burst out of it when he bit down…

Focus. He had to focus. He had to decide if it was worth it, before all powers of deciding were beyond him and he became nothing more than a ravenous beast. A fucking Titan in human skin. The thoughts in his head disgusted him.

Still, he had to swallow before he could speak. "Who… does anyone know you're out here?"

Erwin, somehow, looked completely calm. "Even if nobody did, I could just lie to you, you realize."

"No you couldn't, dipshit, I can fucking smell lies," Levi bullshitted on the spot. "Answer the question before I rip your arms off." He flexed his grip, straining the man's shoulder joints painfully, demonstrating exactly how easy it would be for him. Like plucking flower petals. Erwin grimaced, but otherwise showed no signs of fear or submission.

"I'm not stupid, Levi. A recruit got up to use the bathroom and noticed that you were missing. As soon as he reported, I had my men secure your cohorts in an isolated room. If they don't hear from me by morning, they have their orders."

Isabel and Farlan. Levi froze in place, all thoughts of bloodlust fleeing his mind. He felt like he'd had a bucket of ice water dumped over him. Fuck. _Fuck_. This paranoid asshole—he was good. He was too good. Levi was so stupid! Of course he'd been out looking for the missing criminal. Of course this encounter hadn't been an accident. He should have stuffed something under the covers of his bunk. He should have hunted further afield, mindful that any local crime might be traced back to the resident criminal element. He should have… He should have…

God, it was too late. He was well and truly fucked this time, wasn't he?

"You'd let innocent people die, just to get revenge on me?" he demanded, emphasizing his rage by slamming the man against the shingles again. "They have nothing to do with this, you bastard! They're not like me!"

"I only have your word for that," Erwin pointed out, still infuriatingly calm. Infuriatingly superior. Unflappable fucking bastard, trying to sound so aloof when he was the one pinned to the shingles with a hungry ghoul salivating inches away from his fucking throat! Then, icing on the cake, he added, "You sacrificed yourself for them once before. I wonder if that still applies now."

Incandescent fury lit Levi's blood-red eyes. "I only have _your_ word that you told anyone at all, much less gave any orders."

"I thought you could smell lies?"

With an inarticulate growl of rage, Levi's hands sprang away from his prisoner. He rose and backed away, tightly coiled to attack at any moment. He made an effort to breathe slowly, evenly, trying to control the rage and hunger that howled inside of him. "What the fuck do you want, then?"

Erwin levered himself upright slowly, not taking his eyes off of Levi even to look for his missing sword. "I want to know what you are."

Levi scoffed. "Just kill me if you're going to kill me, shitstain, don't pussyfoot around it."

"Answer the question first."

"A ghoul! I'm a fucking ghoul, okay?" Levi snapped, gesturing sharply at his eyes. "What, did the fucking kakugan not tip you off? Or do high society military brats not get told ghost stories like everybody else?"

"A ghoul." Erwin moved closer, movements deliberately slow. Levi didn't think he could stiffen any further, but somehow he managed. His face was twisted in what must have been a horrifying rictus. "Ghouls are a myth."

"As you can clearly see." Sarcasm oozed around the edges of a snarl.

Finally, Erwin took his eyes off of Levi to search for his lost sword. The 3DM lines, still embedded in the edge of the roof, retracted into their coils with a low whirr. Levi just stood there, frozen in place while the man fully turned his back to retrieve the blade. Fuck him. Fuck his smug assurance. Fuck him for humiliating Levi like this. Just… fuck him.

At last, Erwin turned back, holding up his sword to inspect it for cracks. As if that little bit of tossing around could put a nick in a thrice-folded steel Titan blade. The thing practically gleamed with lethality in the moonlight.

"So?"

Erwin glanced up. "So what?"

Levi's teeth clenched. "So are we going to do this here, or do you want to get back to street level first?"

Erwin blinked. "I'm not sure what you mean."

"You! Killing me!" Levi barked. "Do you really need me to spell it out? How the fuck do you find your asshole to take a shit in the morning, do you need a fucking map?!"

"I'm not going to kill you."

That brought him up sharply. "…What?"

"Not right now, at least. You're going to come to headquarters with me without making a scene, and I'll tell my men to let yours get back to their training. Then, you and I are going to talk. At length." A corner of his mouth turned up, dry and mirthless. "I know someone who's going to be dying to meet you."

The humiliation burned like swallowed bile throughout Levi's entire body. He itched and chafed where tacky blood was drying on his skin. His stomach ached sharply, and his kakugan did not want to go away no matter how much he tried to calm down.

What kind of fucking choice did he have?

Levi followed behind Erwin like an obedient dog as he leaped back into the alley to retrieve the sword embedded in the wall. He didn't protest when the green Survey Corps cloak was dropped over his head to hide the blood and red eyes. He stayed meek and silent as a shadow as the man informed the authorities of a murder two streets down from the local tavern. And he walked pretty as you please behind Erwin straight through headquarters into a small basement room, and didn't fight back when the barred door was shut behind him and locked with a scraping click.

He curled up once he was sure he was alone and hated hated _hated_ Erwin Smith.


End file.
